“Unless one lives and loves in the trenches, it is difficult to remember that the war against dehumanization is ceaseless.” –Audre Lorde

The Business of the City: Miscellaneous

Tuesday, June 30, 2015

LEARN TO SWIM FOR FREE WITH RECREATION: YOUR LIFE MAY DEPEND ON IT

The Plainfield Division of Parks and Recreation is offering free swimming lessons through the U.S. Swimming Foundation's MAKE A SPLASH program during the summer at all three municipal pools.The schedule for the free swimming lessons is as follows:

Access
to swimming lessons is especially important in a city like Plainfield,
which has a large African American community, because, according to the
Centers for Disease Control, 70% of black Americans don't know how to
swim. There is a legacy there, partly tied up in the history of
racism/segregation, when blacks were not allowed in public pools.

The
article I posted below (from TakePart, written by Britni Danielle) is about a YMCA initiative, but it is relevant to our city. The article quotes the CDC, noting "...for black children the
chances of drowning are 'significantly higher than those for whites and
Hispanics at every age from five years through 18.'While the risk of
unintentional drowning persists throughout childhood, the age when black kids
are most vulnerable is 10." The entire article is below--just click on the title link if you want to copy and share.

A YMCA initiative seeks to expand
access to water safety and swimming lessons.

Summertime means barbecues, long
sunny days, and cool dips in the nearest body of water. But for many Americans,
swimming can quickly move from innocent summer fun to life-ending tragedy. With this in mind,
the YMCA has embarked on an ambitious nationwide program that aims to teach
thousands of kids how to stay safe.

“Swimming is a life skill,” says
Janet Wright, the YMCA’s Safety Around Water
national spokesperson and aquatics director at the organization’s North
Philadelphia branch. “The Y has taken a national stand to talk about water
safety and make sure everyone knows and understands that this is important, and
it’s something that will help you for the rest of your life.”

The Safety Around Water program
consists of eight 40-minute lessons that teach kids how to “jump, push, turn,
grab, and swim, float, swim” if they ever find themselves in a pool, river, or
lake. The program also makes sure kids learn two cardinal rules: Never swim
alone, and never swim without a lifeguard present.

“We’re really trying to give them
information about being safe,” Wright says. Her goal? To say to kids, “Don’t
even put yourself in [an unsafe] situation because you don’t even know what can
happen.”

So, Why Should You Care? According to the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention, 10 people die from unintentional drowning every single
day, and for black children the chances of drowning are “significantly higher
than those for whites and Hispanics at every age from five years through 18.”
While the risk of unintentional drowning persists throughout childhood, the age
when black kids are most vulnerable is 10.

Even when children follow Wright’s
main rules—never swim alone or unattended—bad things can happen. On Monday, a black teenager,
14-year-old Brionne Sloan, almost became another unintentional drowning victim
when he sank to the bottom of a public pool
in DeKalb County, Georgia. Another swimmer was able to pull him up, but what
happened next shocked everyone.

Although there were lifeguards, who were also
black, on duty at the pool, Browns Mill Family Aquatic Center, none of them
could allegedly swim in deep water or do CPR, something Sloan desperately
needed.

“I saw three of the workers walking
away, shaking their heads,” Sloan’s mother, Melissa, told a local news station,
explaining that her son was unconscious, “completely blue,” and not moving.

The teen was rushed to a local
hospital, where he remained in the ICU for several days before doctors were
able to wean him off the ventilator and allow him to breathe on his own. He is
lucky, as he doesn’t seem to have experienced any brain damage.

Sloan’s ordeal is not unique. In
2010, six black teenagers from two families drowned in Shreveport, Louisiana’s Red
River while trying to save a friend. Sadly, the teens’ friends and
family, who watched in horror as they drowned, couldn't save them—they couldn’t
swim either.

While it’s often said jokingly that
black folks don’t swim, that they drown at such an alarming rate is no laughing
matter. It isn't just because black people hate the water. Though 70 percent of
black folks can’t swim, lack of access to public pools and a history of segregated swimming
have kept many of them out of the water.

“African Americans were not allowed
to swim in the ’40s or ’50s, so if your grandparents didn’t know how to swim,
then they didn’t teach your parents, and if your parents didn’t swim, then you
might not be a swimmer,” Wright says. “So now it’s just about changing the
mind-set at this point.”

The YMCA is hoping its water safety
program will help. In addition to making sure young people don’t become
drowning victims, the organization also hopes to get more kids of color into
the pool. To further this aim, it is hoping to reach as many young people as
possible by providing 13,000 scholarships for kids in low-income communities to
participate in the class. It’s something the Y hopes both parents and kids will
participate in.